Holland coffee roaster Simpatico percolated from trip to Mexico

Press Photo | Cory MorseAlex Fink is pictured on coffee bean bags inside his business Simpatico Coffee in Holland. The locally roasted Mexican beans can currently be purchased at independent grocery stores in Holland, Saugatuck, Douglas and South Haven.

HOLLAND — A bad vacation experience and serendipity led art gallery owner Alex Fink to a new career roasting and wholesaling Mexican coffee beans for Michigan markets through his new company, Simpatico Coffee.

Fink, 40, said a rainy, cool family vacation in Florida a few years ago led him to search out the sunniest place in the Americas for their next vacation.

“I found Puerto Escondido in southwest Mexico got the most sunny days and booked our next vacation there. On our flight, our stewardess asked our destination and suggested we should the visit the Oaxaca coffee region and its beautiful mountain coffee-growing area,” said Fink, who with his wife, Sarah Harris, discovered there a flavorful, low-acidic coffee.

“We brought back a suitcase full of the coffee, and all our friends loved it. On our next trip, we brought back three suitcases of coffee for ourselves and friends and an idea we might have discovered something,” said Fink, who began thinking there might be a U.S. market for this high-altitude Mexican-grown coffee.

The beans of the Oaxaca coffee region are from Ethiopian seeds, which are considered among the best coffee beans in the world. Because the coffee beans mature at an altitude above 3,000 feet and are shaded by the surrounding forests, they are rich in flavor and have less acidity.

“Mexico is the fifth-largest coffee producer in the world but not as well-known or branded as coffees from Brazil or Columbia. Part of my market plan is to make people in the U.S. aware of the wonderful coffee beans from Mexico,” he said.

Fink started Simpatico Coffee in May in a 2,500-square-foot plant at 494 Lincoln Ave. in Holland with a roaster, packaging line and three part-time employees.

While summer is not a great time for introducing new hot coffee products, Diana Van Kolken, owner of Shaker Messenger at 210 South River Ave. in Holland, found she got a huge response to Simpatico Coffee at her store.

“Even in the hottest weather, people would come in and take a sample and just rave about how good it was and then buy some to take home,” said Van Kolken, a coffee aficionado who loves the robust taste of the Mexican bean and its low acid content.

The company has lined up 50 West Michigan outlets — mostly coffee shops, restaurants and specialty stores such as Nature’s Market and Butch’s Restaurant in Holland. Its biggest customer is Hope College Food Service. Fink said they are hoping to crack a big grocery chain in the next few months.

Simpatico Coffee — a division of the couple’s Two Cups Coffee Co. drinknicecoffee.com — produces regular and decaffeinated coffee beans in medium roast, dark roast and a mix of the two called black and tan that retail for about $12 to $15 a pound.

The company on Tuesdays from 7:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. sells coffee to the public from its plant for $8.50 a pound.

Simpatico Coffee has imported about 34,000 pounds of coffee so far this year and has the capacity to roast about 75 to 100 pounds of beans an hour.

“I can’t say what we spent to get started buying roasting machines and for setup, but it was a lot — over six figures,” Fink said.

The company is considered a “single origin roaster” meaning all of its beans come from the same location and are not mixed with other coffee beans grown in other locations.

Fink said the company is also Altitude Rated, which means the beans have been grown above the 3,000 feet altitude mark that produces some of the finest coffees.

The beans are also fair-trade purchased.

“The growers get the same price from me they would on the coffee markets without deductions (for a distributor),” said Fink, who works with a local exporting company to ship the beans.

“This coffee needs 35 to 50 percent growing shade from the tree canopy for best production and if a grower goes out of business, the lumber producers come in and clear the mountain shade trees,” said Fink. “We want them to survive and so we pay a fair price for the beans,” he said.

Fink is a 1993 graduate of Hope College and started his career as a media relations specialist for the American Red Cross in Holland.

He and his wife opened the Nines Art Gallery at 17 W. 10th St. in 1999. The couple met while he was working at a Saugatuck art gallery.